The Media Wonk spent last week in Las Vegas at the Consumer Electronics Show where, everybody said, 3DTV would be the big story. And sure enough, nearly everywhere you went on the show floor folks were sporting either polarized shades or the full Geordi La Forge wraparounds and squinting at the new 3D displays tucked into carefully light-controlled alcoves of the display booths, like so many bug-eyed NFL refs going under the hood.

Yet for all the hoopla over 3D, the really important TV story out of CES was the explosion of embedded applications on Internet-capable HDTVs and Blu-ray players for bringing over-the-top (i.e. Internet-delivered) video into the living room. A year ago at CES there were only a few such TV sets on display, from a handful of manufacturers, and about all you could do with them was run a few Yahoo widgets and stream Netflix movies. At this year’s show, it was hard to find a home entertainment device that wasn’t Internet-ready, and if it didn’t come with its own app store it came embedded with one of the growing number of online content platforms from the likes of Vudu, DivX, Rovi and Boxee, among others.

Far more than 3D, set-makers’ growing commitment to enabling over-the-top video delivery to HDTV screens holds the potential to shake up the future evolution of the TV business. Read More »

Events

Judges on a federal appeals court on Thursday grilled the Department of Justice (DOJ) over its challenge to a lower court decision blessing the AT&T-Time Warner merger. Source: Judges grill DOJ over challenge to AT&T-Time Warner merger

Netflix and Amazon view Europe as a key battleground, but a new local quota and pushback from traditional broadcasters present challenges. Source: Netflix, Amazon Face New Parameters and Challenges in Europe

A media landscape prone to tectonic shifts is likely to feel a series of aftershocks once Democrats take control of the House. Source: Media mega-mergers under threat with Democrats controlling the House

MoviePass CEO Mitch Lowe opens up about ticketing service’s tumultuous year and its plans to battle back from the brink. Source: MoviePass Announces New Pricing While Promising to Win Back Customers’ Trust

Comcast Xfinity TV customers will be able to sync their accounts with Movies Anywhere in order to access their movie purchases from the Xfinity Digital Store alongside those from other digital retailers. Source: Digital movie collection app Movies Anywhere adds its first pay TV partner, Comcast

Four months after Comcast announced it was integrating Amazon Prime Video, the app is finally rolling out to Comcast’s Xfinity platform nationwide. Source: Amazon Prime Video is finally coming to Comcast Xfinity

The main issue of live streaming is that it potentially damages the broadcasters’ investment whereby the benefits of exclusive rights owed to them fail to tally with the expected output. Source: Digital Streaming: Snuffing The Life Out Of Live Sports On TV